Trailer for Smoked which screens both Saturday & Sunday @ Vitus/410 Ballroom
as part of the 2012 Oakland Underground Film Festival

Now in its fourth year the Oakland Underground Film Festival (OAKUFF), which kicks off this evening Thursday Sept 27th and runs through Sunday Sept 30th, is shaping up to be quite an impressive independent film festival boasting 17 different films (local and international) of varying budgets and styles (documentaries/features/shorts). Many of OAKUFF's entries, but not all, have some tie to the East Bay city that the festival calls home. Perhaps most "Oakland" of all of this year's entries is the Oaksterdam themed comedy/action feature Smoked (trailer above) which is described by its makers as a "dark comedy about the misadventures of three gutter punk stoners whose housewarming party ends in flames. In their desperation, they create a half baked plan to rob an Oakland Cannabis Club." The film is directed by Joshua Staley and Jamie DeWolf and today I caught up with director DeWolf to ask him how screening his film at the Oakland festival stands apart from other places where Smoked has been shown? "The screening of at the Oakland Underground Film Festival is absolutely different because this movie is as Oakland as it gets; literally 15 pivotal scenes were filmed three years ago within walking distance of the theater we'll be showing it in. It's always been our goal to show Oakland in all it's wild raucous glory and where better to do it than from the heart of Oakland itself?" Smoked screens twice during the festival: Saturday at 7pm and Sunday at 8pm at Vitus / 410 Ballroom (Geoffrey's) at 410 14th Street near Broadway.